


seven o five

by runningfaucet



Category: NCT (Band)
Genre: F/M, Luckily, M/M, Magic AU, Magical Items, Oblivious Reader, Other, and jungwoo happens to be around, human reader, in which you step on a different bus to work than usual, jungwoo x reader, magic bus, spoilers in the tags, wizard!jungwoo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-03
Updated: 2019-01-03
Packaged: 2019-10-03 16:26:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,073
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17287463
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/runningfaucet/pseuds/runningfaucet
Summary: the morning is filled with darkness and fog that hangs between the trees.





	seven o five

_You’re late, late, late_ , it echoes in your head.  
I’m not, you think to yourself, partly in an attempt to quieten the annoying voice and partly because you’re not.  
You weren’t even supposed to be awake yet and the only reason your Manager got hold of you was because you had forgotten to put your phone into the ‘Do not disturb’ mode.  
“I’m not late; if I manage to open the shop even close to our usual hours they should be grateful.” You angrily mumble.

_Two_ people falling sick on the same day, in the same shift - what are the odds.

You’re mindful enough to pocket the cookies and a bottle of water for a less than grown-up lunch before rushing out of the door, turning back last minute to grab the keys to the shop and the shared flat.

Outside is still dark.  
A fat drop of water hits your head after stepping out of the door and you shiver at the icy temperature, glaring at the fog that hangs thickly between the trees.  
It’s so dense you can only make out shapes here and there.

It comes to no surprise that just as the stop comes into sight, the bus passes it.  
Even your little jog after you’d seen it approaching didn’t help, leaving you slightly sweating, out of breath and frustrated as the red taillights vanish in the distance.  
“I’m not getting paid enough to do this.”  
Another look at your phone and the transport app tells you you can either wait for the next bus - arriving in 15 minutes at quarter past seven - or walk a couple of blocks to catch the next vehicle on a parallel street.

Lowering the phone you stare off into the distance, trying to decide what to do.

The silence presses on your ears.  
Even the cars on the opposite side of the road are barely audible on their approach and disappearance.  
The streetlamp’s yellow glow only reaches so far; the houses behind the trees are dipped in darkness.  
A shiver runs down your back.  
Shouldn’t the sun be up already?

But then again it is autumn. The leaves, wet and slippery under your boots, are a telltale sign the year dips to its end.  
You huff out a breath that shows in a cloud of pearly white before melting into the rest of the air.

For a moment no car passes by.  
Everything is undisturbed, and if you keep very still, it almost seems like the world holds its breath.  
Cotton fills your ears.

You turn your head and the strong headlights of a bus almost blind you.  
The fog is even thicker now, and only the little cabin in your back remains as an anchor to the world.  
Baffled, you try to read the time on your watch - isn’t the next bus to come in ten minutes?

You have barely enough time to read the terminal station displayed over the windshield; the busroute would take you to the train.  
Why not take the subway for a change? You could do that.

The driver’s door opens and without much more thought you climb the single step that leads inside.

The cardreader next to the driver has the sign “out of order”, written with something inky and dark on rough paper glued to it..  
“Tap in at the back?” You ask, a bit taken aback.  
“If it works.” The driver croaks, tilting their head with the cap towards the road as they indicate their turn.  
Their face is weirdly shaped, you think.

There’s a handful of people sprinkled throughout the bus, but you don’t take particular notice of anyone on your way to the backdoor and the cardreader located there.  
It beeps as you press your ticket to it, even though the noise sounds a bit more metallic than usual.  
It’s when you turn around and search for a nice place to sit down that you begin to feel like this is the wrong bus.

There’s only one person sat in the back, huddled against the window and asleep. As the bus passes underneath a streetlight it briefly illuminates their face - glints on something around their lips.  
You turn your head away and slip into a seat two rows in front of the person, on the other side of the aisle.

The windows could be covered in condensation, it wouldn’t make a difference. The thick white air from outside presses against the glass, obscuring any and all landmarks you usually enjoy checking off your mental list of things you pass on your way to work.  
It’s dark inside the bus. Even though the lights are burning it’s a rather dim glow they spend. It makes it difficult to see the other passengers. The fog seems to even mute the engine; the only indication you’re moving the soft vibration you feel from the seat.

The speakers crackle and cut off half of the announcement of the next stop. Suddenly aware that it’s the first time you heard such an indication of a stop your head perks up from where it slumped against the window.

The bus beeps as it kneels down, a light flaring up above the door at the front.  
It’s not bright, not exactly, it just… illuminates the person entering, gives their face sharp angles and a soft glow around the areas that should be flat in shadow.  
They drop a hand full of coins into a little box and the driver gives them a transfer. The hand looks too large.

The light turns off and the bus is dipped back into the same blueish dim glow from before. You’re a heartbeat too slow in averting your eyes before they meet the ones of the new passenger - a young man, similar to your age, by the looks of it.  
The only thing that discerns him from you is the hat, pointy and- The baseball cap has a few holes along the part that gives shade, rings looped through them.  
He turns his face back to the driver, exchanging a few words, and you can’t help but feel uncomfortable.

The new passenger reaches out with the hand that you could have sworn was just touching the broad rim of his hat, to hold on to one of the dark orange bars as the bus lurches into another lane, narrowly avoiding something big on the left.  
There’s no time to do anything before the stranger slides into the seat right next to yours, even though half the bus is still empty.

“What are you doing here?” He asks, and even though there is a sweet smile on his lips his voice betrays him.  
He sounds upset, like you sat down on his birthday cake in this very spot.

“I’m sorry?” Your voice breaks halfway through and you press a hand to your mouth, clearing your throat.  
The young man’s eyes widen. He places his left arm over the backrest behind you as the other occupants of the bus begin to stirr.

The speaker announces the next stop - the subway station.

You pull on the thin line running along the bus’s side, bewildered when the small plastic coated wire feels entirely too warm, too smooth.  
The stranger leans forward and presses a button on one of the bars, sighing as he regards you with a side eye.

You bury the hand that touched the little sna- You ball your hand into a fist inside your pocket, trying not to think about what you just touched.  
He doesn’t press you for an answer to the question he’d asked before, nervously glancing around the cabin as the bus slows down.  
The shadows that are the other passengers begin to move. The person in the back behind you audibly sniffs.

“Come.” The stranger whispers, face scrunched up. He drags you by your wrist, and where his hand touches your skin as your cardigan slips back there’s a tingling feeling.  
The dim air inside the bus lifts, only slightly.

There’s a large, thick tail lying over the middle of the aisle in the front.

The person in the back snaps their mouth shut after a yawn; you catch a glint of yellow eyes and too many teeth.

The light above the backdoor springs on and the stranger almost shoves you out of the bus, nearly falling over the threshold after you.  
You turn back in time to see the doors snap shut. Something like a thin layer of dust rises from them.  
Eyes shine from the backseat next to the window, fixed on you standing outside, and you can’t look away.  
A grin that isn’t a grin stretches below those eyes.

Cold spreads in the middle of your stomach as you feel like you’re falling.

“How long did- where did you get on? How far did you ride?”  
The fog is still hanging in the air, but here, a bit further up the hill, it isn’t as dense as in the valley anymore.  
“What do you-” The edges of your vision grow fuzzy and you reach out for something to hold to.

His shoulder is bony underneath your touch as you take deep breaths.  
Hands on your upper arms help you over to the little bench under the artificial light of the stop; he crouches down in front of you while you shiver.  
Your fingers, cold and clammy, slip between his hands, warm and dry.  
Safe.

Tears run over your cheek.

“It’s okay, it’s okay.” He smiles, and this time you can really see his face for the first time.  
The deep blue cap covering his brownish hair has the logo of a popular aerospace company on it, additional stitching on the side displays a constellation. How fitting.  
His eyes are big and soft.

“Wha-” You want to ask, but a slender finger presses on your lips, shushing you.

He takes the cap off, ruffling his short hair. His fingers fiddle with the rings that are attached to the rim. After they fall into his palm he sets the cap on your head.  
You’re speechless.

“Take care, okay?” He asks, still kneeling before you. “Don’t just get on any bus. It’s dangerous.”  
He rises, holding on to the strap of his leather bag over his shoulder.

“Wait.” You croak out, confusion making your voice thick. “Who are you? What- That bus-?”  
But he only smiles and lifts his hand in greeting before skipping along the street, into the sunrise that gently parts the tufts of white.

You lean forward to keep an eye on him but in doing so leave the shade a single bar of the stop provided, causing the sun to shine directly into your face.  
After you rub at your eyes and open them again the stranger is gone.  
All that remains of him is the cap on your head, that you gingerly touch before taking off to look at it.

The stitching on the side has a small circle on the beginning of a line that runs vertically down before doing a sharp turn to the left and ending in a small dip.  
Several points the thin, glittering line crosses are made to look like little stars - a star sign, maybe? You don’t recognize it immediately.  
It is without doubt beautiful.

_If only you would have gotten the name of stranger, who res…_ You pause and look down on your ticket, ready to be tapped in at the gate to the subway.  
Then you continue, shaking your head.

 

The cap stays on your head all day. Not many people seem to take notice of it, but in return you don’t notice anything unusual.  
It’s only when you have one foot on the step of a bus that will bring you home that you’re reminded of the morning.

The busdriver smiles and nods his head as you enter, and you smile and nod back. The inside is warm and filled with people, the windows a little foggy.  
You shimmy into a seat that a child must have sat in before - there’s scribbling in the condensation on the glass, something almost looking like a symbol.

As the bus stops at the next red light your eyes travel to the front of the bus, looking out.  
For someone, you realize after a moment, but you can’t quite recall…

Soft eyes and a smile come to your mind, and the feeling of safety, and you don’t need to remember more.

**Author's Note:**

> come bother me on tumblr : @nam_nam_joon


End file.
